


Three Wise Monkeys

by eggsinsunnyside



Category: Eddsworld - All Media Types
Genre: Drug Use, Future AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-03
Updated: 2017-12-03
Packaged: 2019-02-10 02:10:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,956
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12901704
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eggsinsunnyside/pseuds/eggsinsunnyside
Summary: Don't look. Don't speak. Don't hear.A somewhat continuation to Dope.





	Three Wise Monkeys

Edd hummed himself a short cheerful tune as he switched his computer off. Another commission finished for the day and freeing up his workload by just a bit. At this rate, the others wouldn’t have to worry too much about rent coming up and they could go on another adventure again. 

Speaking of adventures, how long has it been since they last went on one? 

Edd frowned as he tried thinking back to their last adventure, the latest memory he could recall involving snow and giants. There was also the vague sense that lots of puns had been involved in that particular incident as well as a thunderous boom of something exploding, but the exact details were unclear to the brunette. 

Maybe they really should start going on adventures again soon. He was starting to forget the old adventures now, and that wouldn’t do. He quickly glanced at the clock sitting on his bedside table, reading 3 AM on it. 

‘Eh, one cola and then I’ll go to sleep.’ Edd slid off his swivel chair, stretching out his backs to hear the satisfying cracks and made his way to the kitchen for a cola can. The entire house was silent in his journey, only his soft footsteps could be heard. 

Fingers fumbled in the pocket of his hoodie, seeking the key that’d unlock the fridge full of beverages. After the debacle with Matt and Atlantis, Edd was chosen to be the keeper of the key as Matt would lose it again in some other ridiculous fashion and Tom would empty the entire fridge in less than a week if he had the key. 

“Where’s that stupid key…” Edd grumbled under his breath, before a triumphant smile stretched across his face when his fingers grasped the metallic object and pulled it out. “Aha! There it is.”

“Edd?” 

Edd let out a sharp startled noise, straightening out of surprise and spun on his heel to face the voice’s owner. “Who’s there?!”

A person stepped in closer, the light of the fridge illuminating his figure somewhat. Tall, around Edd’s height and just fell behind by a bit, a green overcoat. Beard growing along his jawline, dark brown hair and an expression of sheer disbelief plastered on his face. There’s something so familiar about the man but Edd doesn’t know him. He doesn’t know him at all.

“Edd, is that you?”

“Eduardo?” The name slips out of Edd’s mouth before he knows it, a surge of recognition and memories flooding into his mind. Eduardo, his neighbour. Neighbour since for a long time, getting caught up in their shenanigans and once got haunted by a demonic ghost thing. How could he have forgotten him?

“What’re you doing here?”

“I should be asking you that, moron!” Eduardo hissed, coming closer to the artist. “Where the hell have you been all this time, and dressed like that too?”

“I’ve been here all day, Eduardo.” Edd frowned at the growing familiar annoyance in Eduardo’s tone. “Wait, how did you even get in here? The front door’s locked.”

“Who in their right mind would walk through the front door in a place like this?” Eduardo balked before heaving out a sigh and rubbed his temples, “You know what- Forget it. Do you know how long we’ve been looking for you morons? We all thought you were dead!”

“Who’s we? Eduardo, back up there and keep your voices down. The others are sleeping.” Edd said, voice lowered into a hush. 

“So your other morons are here too?” Eduardo furrowed his brows, “Christ, all this time.. And you lot were here.” He glanced around the room frantically, scanning the area as if he was searching for something and grabbed Edd’s arm roughly. “Whatever. We’re getting you out of here now.” 

“Wait what-” Was all Edd managed to say before Eduardo began to physically drag him over to a giant hole in the lounge - when the hell did that get there - and out of the house. “Eduardo, what the hell are you doing?!”

“What else do it look like? I’m rescuing your sorry ass, moron.” Eduardo whispered harshly, speeding up his pace and forcing Edd to speed up as well, least he’d trip over his feet. 

“Rescuing from what?!”

“The Red Army, you idiot. God, did all that imprisonment waste away that peanut brain of yours?” Eduardo groaned, ignoring the small glare Edd shot at him. 

Edd balked at the male and yanked his arm out of Eduardo’s grasp. “Okay, first of all, I don’t know whatever the Red Army is. Second of all, imprisonment? You’re practically kidnapping me from my house!” 

“You consider that cell block a house? What is this, stockholm syndrome?” 

“No, you’ve blown up a hole in my house which I’m pretty damn sure was not there the last time I checked.” Edd said and paused, “And stockholm syndrome only happens when a person gets attached to their kidnapper.”

“Yeah, and you got yourself kidnapped in this hell hole.” Eduardo rolled his eyes irritatedly. 

“No, you’re the one kidnapping me from my home.” Edd corrected, crossing his arms.

Eduardo stared at the artist for a solid minute, unnerving the latter before narrowing his eyes. “You actually think that building was your home. You think you’re still in Dirdum Lane, don’t you?”

Edd faltered for a moment before nodding, “Uh… Yes?” 

The next thing he knew, pain was blossoming at his stomach and forcing him to kneel down on the ground. He couldn’t even let out a cry when shortly afterward, something smacked against his head hard and sent his world black quickly.

When Edd woke up again, it took him a while to realise that he wasn’t in his room - probably even in his home. He let out a miserable groan as pain began to drum in his head and rubbed his fingers against his temples. 

“Wake up, loser.” Eduardo’s gruff voice greeted his ears. Edd cursed softly under his breath, cracking his eyes open wide to look at the male. “Finally awake are you now?”

“Why the hell did you kidnap me?” Edd demanded testily, glaring at the other. 

“Before you start demanding why I punched your sorry ass out of there, drink this shit. Doctor’s order.” Eduardo answered, holding out a plastic cup filled with water and two white pills in the other hand. When Edd simply stared at the two objects in his hand, Eduardo lowered his voice to a growl, “Don’t make me shove it down your throat because I will do that.”

“Okay, okay fine geez.” Edd said, reluctantly taking the two objects and gulping down the pills. He grimaced when his headache receded into becoming less painful, but an annoying thrum was starting to play in his ears. “What kind of painkiller is that meant to be, because that did literally nothing to help.”

Eduardo ignored the other’s jab and crossed his arms, “Do you remember the Red Army?” 

“What kind of question is that?” Edd snarked.

“Just answer the damn question. I don’t want to talk to you long either, loser.”

“Fine. No, I don’t know any red army.” The artist huffed. 

“Red leader?” 

“Who’s that?”

“Giant red robot with a missile launcher?”

“Wh- No. Why the hell would I know something like that?” Edd furrowed his brows in befuddlement. 

“Oh I don’t know, because it blew up your actual house and killed Jon?” Eduardo replied sarcastically. 

“But- Wait- No, that isn’t right.” Edd shook his head frantically, the thrum in his ear starting to get louder. “I-I was just home not long before! You were there, weren’t you? And- And Jon! Jon is still with you guys, isn’t he?”

“Jon’s been dead for a long time, and your house had been blown up ages ago.” Eduardo said quietly, “You weren’t at your house, you were at the Red Army’s base. Why you thought you were there, I don’t know and I don’t know if you’re still hallucinating that crap.” 

“I’m perfectly sane!” Edd protested. 

“Just shut up and listen, moron!” The male barked gruffly, “For all we know, you could’ve gone insane for whatever experiences you were through in the Red Army base. You might actually be sane but hooked onto something that’s making you see stuff. Either way, we won’t know until the doctors figure something out.”

“But Matt and Tom- they’d know if something was wrong, wouldn’t they? They’d point it out to me if I was seeing things.” Edd argued, addled mind trying to piece together some sense of logic that’d counter Eduardo’s discovery. “Just let me go back to the house and I’ll show you - everything’s fine!”

“You aren’t going anywhere. Not until the docs make sure you aren’t actually being insane.”

* * *

The next few weeks of being cooped up in the building was maddening, to say the least. At least Edd was allowed to wander out of the room but he wasn’t allowed to go to certain sections of the base just yet. Eduardo always somehow managed to find him before he could sneak off and drag him back to the allowed areas, not before yelling at him for his ‘moronic’ ideas. 

He was sent to the doctors at least three times per week. They’d occasionally take a blood sample or two, ask Edd several question pertaining to his memory and recollection of his time at ‘home’. Honestly, he was starting to feel like a guinea pig rather than a patient there with how his treatment was being handled. 

Then one day, Eduardo had approached him again, twirling a pair of keys on his finger. “Oi, we’re going out, loser.”

“Out? You mean like- outside out?” When Eduardo nodded, Edd’s face practically burst into light as he let out a cheerful yell. “Finally! I was actually starting to think that I was going crazy while staying cooped up here all week.”

“Yeah well, only reason I’m allowed to take you out is to help with your stupid recovery.” Eduardo grumbled as he guided the brunette to a car. “You wanted to go to your house, didn’t you?”

“Yeah?”

“Then shut up and let me drive. I’m taking you to your old house.” 

The drive was quiet, awkward because usually… What did usually happen? Something should be happening between them and yet, Edd couldn’t put a finger on it. Oh god was he actually going crazy after being stuck in one place for so long?

“You’re awfully quiet.” Eduardo observed, briefly glancing at the artist who scratched his head absentmindedly. 

“It feels awkward.” Edd admitted abashedly, “I mean, something should be happening right? I just can’t figure out what though.”

“Yeah, you’re right to pick up on that.” Eduardo said, turning the car right into another street. “We never went on missions together because a, you’d make stupid moronic ideas and b, you’re a moron. I can’t stand morons.”

“Rude.”

“It’s true though.” Edd’s response to Eduardo’s comment was to blow a raspberry. The brunette felt the car eventually stopping for a pull over and Eduardo’s disgruntled response. “Get out loser, we’re here.”

Edd all but leaped out of the car with a joyful expression, finally free from the seatbelt’s confines and looked up to where his house was, standing in its perfectly normal- 

He blinked and nothing stood in the empty lot.

“Well?” 

Edd frowned and rubbed his eyes, blinking again to check that he wasn’t imagining what he thought he saw. The land was still vacant of any houses. “... Did you take a wrong turn? There’s nothing here.”

“That’s the point, idiot.” Eduardo muttered, arms crossed and tone laced with something much darker that Edd couldn’t identify. “It has been like this for years, Edd.”

“No no no, that shouldn’t be right, I was just home-” Edd pressed his fingers over his eyelids, memories of Matt and Tom replaying clearly in his head. He was there, he was home not so long ago- 

No he wasn’t. He was somewhere else, that he started thinking home. Or maybe years had past that quickly while he was stuck in that base. “This isn’t right! I was home, home with Matt and Tom!”

“Had it always been you three?” Eduardo asked challengingly. “From the start to the end?”

Edd nodded his head furiously, “Of course it has been-!” 

“No it wasn’t.” Eduardo interrupted, holding up a fist. “Before Jon, Mark and I came, there was four of you.” One finger. “You.” Two fingers. “Matt.” Three fingers. “Tom.” Four fingers. “Do you remember the last one?”

Edd’s mouth flew open in a second to retort that no, did Eduardo take him for an idiot, that only three colours would ever occupy the house. Green, purple, blue and- Red. Why did he think red? Nobody wore red in the house like they wear their respective colours, and nobody wore red as often as Edd wore green. 

No wait. There was someone he knew who wore red, but their face was so fuzzy. Like a drawing he tried to erase with a really bad eraser, and it ended up smudging across the clean white paper. Who was that person? That person who was covered in red all over and-

Lording over them with a smile that could’ve belonged to the devil. “Close your eyes and count to ten. Everything will be fine, old friend.” His eyes started to itch and sting from the smoke in the air-

“Edd, fuck sake stop it!” Eduardo swore loudly, grabbing Edd’s arms and wrenching them forcefully away from his face before the latter could gouge his own eyes out from the growing conflict. “What do you see?”

“Red.” Edd’s eyes slowly cracked open.

“What did that tell you?” Eduardo was still holding onto his arms with that tight grip though it had loosened a bit, enough to not hurt anymore. 

Edd stared straight ahead at the empty land. For a flashing moment, a house stood like it always had. Then it was bigger. Then, it was rubble. Finally, nothing was there. There never anything there. “How long?”

“Years. Don’t remember how many anymore, but it was a long time, Edd.” Eduardo responded. “Are you going to try gouge your eyes out again, because I’m getting real tired of holding your arms.”

Edd promptly yanked his arms away, muttering to Eduardo, “Well nobody asked you to grab them.”

“Mark said he would have my hide if I let you get injured again after the recent check up.” Eduardo said irritatedly, crossing his arms, “And I don’t feel like dealing with his chatty ass today.”

Edd slowly walked up to the spot where he could see the door at. No, just the memory of that door. There is no door. He glanced over to the land on the left, expecting to see Eduardo’s house. 

It was empty too. Gone in an explosion, just like his home. Someone else was there too, weren’t they? Buried underneath the rubbles of their home, along with memories and attachments, all burned to the ground.

But wait, if his home was gone all this time despite him seeing otherwise, then were-

“What about Matt and Tom?” Edd asked, looking back at Eduardo hopefully. “Did I imagine them too?”

“No.” Eduardo shook his head. “You three were silent after a mission, and we assumed that either you were hiding somewhere or dead. Finding out you were alive in that base has us now believing another possibility we didn’t consider.”

“Where were we?” The artist questioned, clutching to his head as vague memories began to resurface in his head again.

“A Red Army base. It was meant to be a recon mission but something went wrong.”

White, they were yelling and running but the blinding lights caught them, flashing in their eye and Edd was trying to grab Matt and Tom before they were slipping away from his fingers. 

“You were caught.” 

Black, it was so dark in the cell they were put in, and Edd couldn’t see blue or purple anywhere in sight.

“We lost contact with you.”

Red, a face leaning in so close to his face and a cheshire grin stretching the former’s face, triumph and smugness practically oozing from that mere grin. 

“You were marked as MIA.”

_“Don’t look Edd. You may not like what you see.” The smoke stung his eyes and-_

Edd brought his fingers up to his eyes again but stopped himself in the act. There is no smoke. “Are we going to get them too? Matt and Tom, I mean.”

Eduardo punched Edd on the arm, inciting a pained yelp from the brunette. “That is the stupidest question you have ever asked since coming back. You should already know the answer, moron.”

Edd couldn’t help but let out a chuckle, “Yeah you’re right.” He spun around to head back to the car, turning his back on the vacant land he once called home. 

Eduardo followed him beside him, heaving out a sigh when he saw the growing grin on Edd’s face. “Oh no. You’re thinking of something stupid.”

“Correction. It’s going to be both stupid and wild that Tord will never see it coming in a long shot.” Edd giggled almost madly, the ideas already forming in his head. Before he entered the vehicle, he stopped to look at Eduardo and smiled sheepishly at him, “... Thanks by the way. For waking me up and opening my eyes again.”

Eduardo rolled his eyes though there was the faint hint of a smile on his usual frown. “In exchange for that, you owe us a decent plan to get back at the Red Army." He heaved out a tired sigh and looked at Edd in the eye, "So what’s the plan, Green Leader?”


End file.
